


In the Bleak Midwinter

by Esteliel



Category: Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Caves, Christmas, Handcuffed Together, Huddling For Warmth, M/M, Pre-Slash, Snow, montfermeil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-02-25 22:06:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21772675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Esteliel/pseuds/Esteliel
Summary: On the 24th of December in the year 1823, two men are trying to make their way through a snow-covered forest to the small town of Montfermeil.
Relationships: Javert/Jean Valjean
Comments: 13
Kudos: 78





	1. Chapter 1

Snow was falling. It was December the 24th in the year 1823, and it had been snowing for most of the day, the forest surrounding the little town of Montfermeil covered by a heavy blanket of white. In the Church Square of Montfermeil, a Christmas fair had been set up. Sugared treats were sold, wine was drunk, and in front of a stall that sold a variety of toys and dolls, a small girl in a ragged dress of threadbare linen and red feet in wooden shoes stood spellbound, staring at the largest doll who throned like a queen above the other toys in her robe of pink crepe.

Not far from that marketplace filled with light and the scent of drink and food, a man was making his way through the snow-covered forest, and he was followed by another.

The man knew that he was being pursued. He had known for several hours now. By that point it had been too late to change his destination. There was nowhere to go but the little town of Montfermeil, where he had hoped to find food and rest. Now, he intended merely to find a child and take her away on the first coach that left the inn.

It was eerily silent in the forest. The boughs of the trees above him were bent down beneath a heavy load of snow. Every now and then, one of the boughs would release its load, snow falling down on him and covering the collar of his coat and his white hair.

This man was Jean Valjean, who had come all the way from Toulon. The journey had been long and perilous, for he knew that the police was looking for him. Still, he had thought that they would seek for him in Paris, for there was no reason that he should travel to Montfermeil instead—a small town where people would be wary of any stranger.

But there was the girl and a promise he had made to her mother. It was a promise he intended to keep, despite the man who had so doggedly hunted him ever since Valjean had left the coach in the town of Chelles, from where it was not far to the forest of Montfermeil.

His hands ached with the cold, but still Valjean determinedly went forward. In the icy silence, sound carried far; Javert was not yet close enough that Valjean could hear him, and yet, like a hare that had caught the scent of the hunter, he knew that he was not alone in this forest. Javert was on his trail, and he would not give up until either Valjean was in his grasp once more or Valjean had accomplished his escape.

Valjean blew on his frozen fingers, then hid them again in the sleeves of his coat. He had not expected the sudden cold and the heavy snow. Had he known, he would have bought a warm coat for the child—she would need a warm dress as well, woolen stockings, a hat and gloves.

Would there be time to make such purchases once he made it to the town?

He did not dare to stop to listen for Javert behind him. He thought he might have an hour, maybe two—Javert, after all, did not know where Valjean was going.

The wind began to pick up a little. More snow fell from the trees, blowing into his face. Shivering, Valjean pulled up the collar of his coat before he continued with the same determination, ignoring the cold biting at the exposed skin of his face and the sound of the frozen snow beneath his feet as he continued towards Montfermeil.

Perhaps the wind would pick up further and cover his tracks. Valjean had been to the woods of Montfermeil before, but surely Javert had not; without Valjean’s tracks to follow, Javert might accidentally leave the path and lose precious hours in the frozen wasteland surrounding them.

Valjean took a step forward, a twig snapping loudly underfoot. He stopped, his heart suddenly pumping. In his imagination, it had resounded as loudly as a pistol shot; had Javert heard it?

The woods were silent. All Valjean could hear was the sound of his breathing and the echo of his heartbeat in his ears. He waited for long moments, but the forest remained silent. There was no sound; not even that of an animal.

At last, Valjean exhaled and lifted his foot to take another step forward.

That was when he had first heard the shout. Somewhere in the distance, someone was crying out.

Valjean froze once more. Was it Javert? Had Javert found him? Had he brought other agents to search the forest for Valjean?

His heart shuddering like that of a stag who had come face to face with the hunter, Valjean remained silent, poised for flight as he listened intently.

The forest was silent again. Perhaps he had misheard? Maybe it had been the call of an owl or the cry of a fox…

Just when he had taken a first, careful step forward, there was another cry. This time, although it was soft and seemed to come from far away, it seemed unmistakably that of a human calling out for help.

Valjean trembled, caught between the fear of his pursuer and the instinctive need to assist someone in trouble. For several heartbeats, he remained frozen in indecision, the terrible face of his hunter looming large in his imagination.

At last, his shoulders falling in misery as he shouldered his invisible burden once more, he turned and began to retrace his steps.

He did not dare to call out with Javert so close, but the sound seemed to have come from somewhere behind him. The forest was still utterly silent, all sound muffled by the heavy layer of snow. Once, after he had marched for a good ten or fifteen minutes, he heard the shout again—it was still soft, but seemed closer now, telling him that he was on the right path.

If Javert was indeed pursuing him, would not Javert have been closer to whoever was in trouble? Would not Javert have abandoned his search to go and assist?

Valjean exhaled, his breath escaping in a little cloud of white, misery rising in him once more, for he knew that it was entirely possible that Javert would have ignored the cry if he knew that Valjean was almost in his grasp. If he kept marching in this direction, it was all too likely that he would walk straight into Javert’s arms—and yet he could not turn away from a request for help either, not with the icy cold and the heavy snow that was certain to kill an unprepared traveler.

Valjean kept walking. It was hard to tell the time, for the sun was already low in the sky, the sky overcast. White clouds released their burden of heavy snow unceasingly until his yellow coat was white as the trees all around him, which little by little had turned into strange sculptures of white, the blanket of snow so heavy that not a single glimpse of bark or leaf remained.

As he trod through this labyrinth of white, Valjean at times forgot where he was and who was following him. Little by little, the snow had covered the landscape around him until at last he was surrounded only by indistinctive shapes, lost in a strange dream where there were no walls, no sky, no ground—only white surrounded him, a shapeless wasteland of frozen cold where all life had long since surrendered to sleep.

It came as a shock when he suddenly heard the call again. The voice was very weak now, but it still called for help—and it was very close.

Valjean shook his head as if to shake off the daze that had overcome him together with the snow. As snow fell from his hair so that for a moment, his head was crowned by a halo of silver in the light of the fading sun, he saw at last that he had come to the point where a second set of footsteps had caught up to his own—and where a tree had finally surrendered to its heavy burden of snow and ice, for it had fallen, barring the path. He could not remember having climbed across it; it must have fallen after he had passed, and his pursuer had diverged from the path here to walk around it.

His heart racing, Valjean reluctantly began to follow that second set of footsteps as they led away from the path—only to find himself stopped a few steps later, for the footprints abruptly vanished.

Instead, there was a sudden drop before him, a narrow ravine which must have been covered by ice and snow earlier, for he had never realized that there was such a steep drop so close to where he walked.

Had the traveler disturbed the thin layer of ice and snow as he traversed it while seeking for a way around the fallen tree?

Carefully, Valjean went to his knees, ignoring the cold seeping in through the wool of his trousers. He moved as close as he dared.

“Hello?” he called out, shivering as the sound echoed eerily below, as if there was a vast drop beneath when he knew very well that at most, there might be a fall of a few meters, a shallow gorge with a rivulet below.

Even if the traveler had fallen—surely there had been enough snow to cushion the fall. And he had strength enough to call for help; at most he was in danger of freezing to death during the night.

Once, Valjean had walked in the Alps; he had seen high mountains, the gleam of glaciers and drops whose sight would have made a man’s heart beat with fright. But this was the forest of Montfermeil, a day’s ride from Paris; there were no glaciers here, no mountains from which a foolhardy man might fall to his death at a misstep.

Valjean listened, but there was no answer. He called out a second time, testing the ground before he slowly moved close enough to be able to peer over the ledge—and this time, there was a sound below him, a weak voice that called out for help.

Valjean could just barely make out the form of a man somewhere below, trapped on what seemed to be a narrow shelf of ice with a further drop beneath him.

He could not make out the ground of the ravine, which startled him—but then, though this might not be the dangerous glacier regions of the Alps, was it not possible that the bitter cold had worked on the stone to such a degree that finally some fault in the rock had cracked and widened, that there had perhaps already been a cave, deep below, as could sometimes be found in these parts, and that instead of a shallow gorge caused by the trickle of water over the centuries, this was indeed a deep fissure that led far into the bowels of the earth, opening just in time to swallow an unlucky traveler?

Valjean peered at the drop below. Cold rock, covered by snow and ice. The descent would be difficult, but not impossible for a man who had honed his skills in nineteen years in the bagne of Toulon where he had learned to climb walls and roofs with near invisible holds for his hands and feet.

Valjean called out again, his heart still pounding with the fear that it might be Javert awaiting him down below. This time, only a hoarse groan answered him.

Was the man injured? Half an hour had passed since Valjean had first heard him call out—perhaps more.

From what he had seen of the narrow ledge that had halted the man’s fall, it barely gave him enough space to stand. If he was injured, his strength drained by the bitter cold, he would not have long to live, for as soon as his limbs failed their service, he was certain to fall further down—and this time, there might be nothing to break his fall.

Valjean swallowed thickly, then made certain that the bag he wore slung over his shoulder was firmly in place, so as not to hinder his movements. He drew off his gloves, ignoring the freezing air that bit at his skin.

Then he moved over the ledge and began to climb.

It was slow going. The stones he clung to were icy cold, hurting his fingers until they were red from the cold and barely able to grip, but he had no choice but to trust in their strength, for now his precarious hold on the frozen rock was all that kept him from falling to his own death.

It was eerily quiet in the ravine. The further he descended, the less sound there was, until at last it seemed as if his descent had taken him out of the mortal world and into a strange realm of silence and ice.

At times, he wondered if he was already dead, damned to an eternity of scaling freezing walls that would never grant him his freedom. Nevertheless, he kept on climbing down, descending almost mechanically, his hands and feet finding tiny footholds in the ice while his thoughts slowed until there was nothing left but the cold emptiness all around him and the distant ache of his body.

When he reached the ledge, it came as a shock. For a moment, he was so confused when his foot encountered ground to step on that he halted in amazement, unable to understand what was happening.

At last, slowly, he managed to pry his frozen fingers from the rocks they had clenched around to hold him upright.

The ledge was not quite as narrow as he had feared.

The traveler had slumped against a part of the wall of ice that curved inward a little, affording him just enough space so that he had not slipped off the ledge. He wore a greatcoat of dark wool. That was all Valjean could see of him. Snow had settled on him so that Valjean could barely make out the color of his coat. It might have been black, or gray, or brown; now it was white.

Carefully, Valjean moved closer. He hesitated as he stretched out his hand, but the man did not move, and despite his fear of what might await him, he closed his hand around the man’s shoulder and carefully turned him around.

The face that stared back at him, as pale as the snow with eyes burning as bright as coal in the pallor of his face, was one that had visited him in countless nightmares.

It was Javert.

Valjean reared back, his heart pounding—but a hand had clenched around his wrist, as merciless as iron, and it did not let go.

“Jean Valjean,” the man said in the same hoarse voice that was undeniably that of Javert, “now I have you.”

Valjean could not say what had happened next. He had not intended to resist Javert; their position was dangerous enough that any movement at all could cause their death, and after all, they were both trapped down here. To escape, Javert would have to trust him, and the ice would not forgive even the slightest struggle.

Later, Valjean thought that instinct might have made him rear back without conscious thought, or else, that Javert might have lunged forward, the heat of his ire letting him forget where he was.

Whatever the cause, the result was that there was a sudden crack—a discordant sound, like crystal shattering, or like the sound made by the ice that formed on shallow puddles in winter when one trod upon it, watching it splinter beneath one’s boot at every step.

There was no time for regret, no time even to shout a warning.

One moment, Valjean found himself staring into the eyes of Javert, which gleamed with the heated satisfaction of the demon who had caught his soul at last. The next, he found himself falling, the iron weight of Javert’s hand still clenched around his wrist even as he plunged into the ravine.

***

Valjean was cold when he awoke. His heart was racing although he could not say why. He was resting against something soft—something soft and warm, although the air that bit at his exposed face was bitterly cold.

It took almost more strength than he possessed to open his eyes. When he finally succeeded, he was so dazzled by the sight that met his eyes that he could not speak for the longest time, staring in quiet awe at the crystals of ice that sparkled all around him.

It seemed to him that he found himself in a palace—only it was not a palace of marble and gold but of pale blue ice. Everywhere he looked, walls of clear crystal arose, breaking the light like a prism so that above them, rainbows stretched through the ice-cold air.

Had he died? Had his soul become trapped in the ice?

He had never seen anything so magnificent before. He was so entranced by the gleam of the crystalline ice that he almost did not realize how bitterly cold it was.

At last, something moved next to him and a voice stirred him from his amazement.

“Are you awake at last? A fine thing this is—you must have thought that the fall would get rid of me, but you will not shake me off so easily.”

His body protesting, Valjean slowly straightened. His muscles ached. He raised his hand to rub hoarfrost from his eyelashes—and then he realized that a familiar weight had closed around his wrist. When he glanced down, he could make out the gleam of metal.

“Yes, Jean Valjean. You won’t escape me now,” Javert said in satisfaction.

It seemed that while Valjean had lain unconscious, Javert had shackled himself to him.

Valjean stared at the handcuffs, then looked up to gaze at their surroundings. As much as the grandeur of the crystalline cave had dazzled him before, now his heart began beating faster again as despair overwhelmed him once more.

“Where would I go?” he said hoarsely. “I don’t know where we are.”

“A cave,” Javert said. “That much is certain.”

“A cave, like this? In the forest of Montfermeil?”

Valjean looked around uneasily. As beautiful as their surroundings were, an unease had taken hold of him—and it grew stronger with every passing minute. Where before, the dazzling beauty of the ice had drawn him in and held him captive until he had barely even felt the cold anymore, now he was filled with a apprehension he could not shake off, and the glory of the sparkling walls of ice paled when he began to consider them as the walls of a prison instead.

“What else would it be?” Javert said curtly. “Anyway, I’m not your dupe. I know very well what you are up to. I will not release you from the handcuffs. Once we have found a way out, I will take you back to a jail, where you belong.”

On any other day, that proclamation would have filled Valjean with terror. Now, all he could think of was the coldness of the ice that entrapped them and how strangely seductive the pulsing light was.

But there was no time to waste—neither on the strange miracle of the cave, nor on Javert’s plans for him.

“It’s a miracle we woke at all,” Valjean said. “We have to find a way out. If we remain in here for too long, we will freeze to death.”

“We came in somehow,” Javert muttered. “It means that there’s a way out.”

Javert’s words gave Valjean a sudden idea, and he began to inspect the ceiling above.

They had fallen—and then, somehow, landed here, which meant that there had to be a crack in the ice above leading to the gorge and thus, back to the path to Montfermeil.

There was a light falling in from somewhere. Valjean could not make out its source, but it was strong enough to see by. It made the translucent ice around them gleam with a clear blue light. Surely this meant that there was indeed an opening above, which had let them in and also allowed the sunlight inside.

For long minutes, he inspected the ice above them, Javert consenting to walk the length of the cave with him while they both peered at the walls above and around them. Finally, they looked at each other, neither of them desiring to be the first to admit it.

There was no hole in the ceiling, no opening through which they had fallen.

At last Valjean cleared his throat. “You were the first to awake,” he said. “What did you see?”

“The same thing you saw,” Javert said reluctantly. “This cave, the ice, the light that illuminates it.”

“What did we rest on?” Valjean said. “There must have been snow falling in, together with us. And then, if enough snow and ice came down with us, the rest of it would have blocked the hole in the ceiling through which we fell, so that now we cannot find it anymore.”

Javert’s lips narrowed. After a moment, he looked away.

“There was no snow,” he said curtly. “I awoke on the ice. I took off my coat to rest upon. Then I put the handcuffs on you.”

“But that’s impossible,” Valjean murmured. “There must be traces of snow—or a trail, if we wandered in, dazed and half-frozen, so cold that we have both forgotten all about it…”

“I saw no such thing,” Javert said doggedly. “Just clear blue crystal stretching as far as I could see, and you, unconscious by my side.”

Valjean studied the ceiling again, but just as before, he could find no trace of an opening, nor the source of the light that illuminated the cavern.

“Then let us walk. We cannot remain still. I don’t think anyone will come looking for us, and if they did, they might not find an entrance, just as we cannot find an exit. If we cannot go up, we might find a tunnel that leads out into the gorge you fell into.”

“And then what? Shall we climb back up, the two of us? Very well,” Javert then said ungraciously, “it seems there is nothing better to do.”

They walked together for what felt like a very long time. At first, the cave had seemed small to Valjean; he soon found out that it was larger than he had expected. It was impossible to tell time down here, since the strange, pulsating light did not change, but it felt as if they had walked for at least an hour before they reached the end of the cave.

Before them, there was an opening in the ice. At first, it had been invisible. As they walked closer, it had gradually appeared, no larger than a line of silver splitting the blueish ice, then gradually growing as they approached until it had reached the width of an opening large enough to admit a carriage.

“Well. That is a start,” Javert muttered and took a step towards it—only to come to a halt when the chain that connected them tightened and pulled on his wrist.

Javert turned around to give Valjean an annoyed look. “What is it now? Dawdling will not save you. If you would rather die down here than go to jail—”

“It’s not that,” Valjean said, his voice hoarse. “Look.”

No light had illuminated the opening as they approached.

Now, light began to pulse in the ice surrounding them, yet leaving the path before them still shrouded in darkness even as the light grew brighter, the glacier-blue of the ice intensifying until Valjean had to close his eyes and turn his face away, his hand instinctively reaching out to keep hold of Javert’s shoulder.

“What’s the meaning of this?” Javert demanded a moment later. “You. What’s your name, and where are we? I am an inspector of police and demand an answer.”

Valjean blinked against the tears caused by the brilliant light. When his vision cleared, he saw that a man was standing before them, barring their way. He was dressed like a simple workingman, carrying the tools of a road mender, his face rough and weatherworn, his eyes suspiciously narrowed at them.

“Got lost, did you?” The man laughed, the sound echoing uncomfortably in the large cavern behind them.

“Do you know the way out?” Valjean asked, ignoring Javert.

The stranger eyed him with interest, his mouth twisting into a smile that did nothing to reassure Valjean. “I might. But there’s a price you have to pay.”

“For God’s sake,” Javert muttered. “Here; I have three francs, surely that will suffice—“

The man ignored him as he spoke. “I demand to know what it is that brings the devil into this forest.”

“Are you mad?” Javert snarled. “Come now, this is not the time to mock me. If you refuse to help, I can have you thrown in a cell; indeed, you have the look of a man who is very well acquainted with such cells, and I would not be at all surprised to find out that the authorities are already searching for a man of your description—”

Ignoring Javert’s words, Valjean took a step forward and gave the man a sharp look. “What do you mean?”

The stranger smiled. “That’s all the payment I ask to let you pass. Merely the answer to a riddle. It’s known that the devil walks through the forest of Montfermeil at midnight. Answer me this question, and I shall let you pass. What is it the devil seeks in this forest?”

“Nonsense,” Javert snapped. “The man is mad—either that, or he is mocking us. Regardless, this seems to be the way out. Let us pass now and I will forget what transpired today.”

Saying so, Javert reached into his pocket with his free hand and drew his pistol. Before Valjean could stop him, Javert had cocked it and aimed it at the stranger, taking a step forward to make his way around him. Valjean watched as the chain tightened, then reluctantly took a step forward as well to follow Javert.

The man did not move, although he watched them calmly, as though he had no reason to fear Javert’s weapon.

Javert took another step, a second—and then he stood still, as if he had run into an invisible wall.

Before them, the air shone with the eerie light of the ice. There was nothing in front of them—nothing but the rent in the ice, the path that led through the opening, and the shadows gathered there.

“What’s the matter, Javert?” Valjean dared to ask a moment later when Javert still had not moved.

When Javert turned his head to look at him, Valjean saw that Javert’s face was deadly pale, his teeth bared in the smile of a furious tiger who had unexpectedly found himself caged.

“Move forward. Come, try to enter this path.”

His gaze going from Javert to the stranger, Valjean took a first step forward, then a second—and then, just as Javert must have, he found his way barred.

It felt as if he had walked straight into a wall—only there was nothing in front of him. No wall, no ice, no sheet of glass that blocked the way. He could feel a cold breeze against his face. But try as he might, he could not step forward.

The stranger’s grin widened.

“If you want to pass, you have to answer my riddle,” he said. “Will you answer?”

“Very well, let me try.” Javert’s voice was full of fury.

Before he could speak, Valjean reached out and touched his arm. “No. Let me answer,” he said quietly.

Something inside him had been filled with a terrible premonition ever since they had found themselves in this cave, and the knowing look of the stranger had stirred something inside him he could not explain—the memory of a journey by coach, a walk through a wood at midnight, of tools hastily discarded and disguised beneath a bush—and of a tree which grew deep in the forest, it’s bark encircled by a sheet of copper.

“What does the devil seek in the forest of Montfermeil?” 

Valjean took a deep breath, the iron shackle around his wrist growing heavier. “He seeks the treasure he buried here,” he said, his throat tight.

Next to him, Javert made a derisive sound—but a moment later, he stumbled forward, the invisible barrier in front of them suddenly gone.

And when they turned around, so was the man.

“Why, what is that?” Javert demanded, his angry voice echoing in the large cave. “Come now, that is no way to treat a man lost underground! Where have you gone?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Valjean said quietly. “He seems to know this place better than we do. If he doesn’t want to be found, I doubt we will succeed. The passage is open; let us continue while we’re still strong enough.”

Javert scoffed, but seemed to see the reason in Valjean’s words. Without further argument, he entered the shadowed passage before them.

The path that led through the ice was narrow. While at first, it had been wide enough for a carriage to pass through, it quickly became so narrow that they could no longer walk next to each other. And it was getting cold…

Valjean shivered. Despite his coat of warm wool, the ice was insidious: little by little, the cold had seeped into his body until now it seemed as the bones of his body had frozen, every single step deeper into the ice bringing new misery.

How much longer could they go on?

“Javert?” he ventured at last.

Javert seemed not to hear him. Miserably, Valjean kept forcing himself forward, step by step by step, until finally he was stumbling over his own feet, his lungs aching when he inhaled.

“Javert?” he said again, the words barely more than a whisper.

This time, Javert stopped.

Gratefully, Valjean grasped hold of his arm, shaking in the cold as he forced his aching feet to take one more step forward.

When he could at last see Javert’s face, he feared for a moment that Javert had died. There were tales of men like that in the bagne, men who died during their grueling work and yet kept walking because they had not yet realized that they were dead.

Javert’s face was as pale as that of a ghost. His lips had a blueish cast to them. He did not appear to see Valjean as he stared at him.

Valjean swallowed, terror filling his own heart for a moment. Did he look as Javert looked? Had he perhaps died as Javert had, here in this cave, without realizing it?

A moment later, he was brought back to his senses when Javert swayed on his feet.

“We need to rest,” Valjean forced out, even though he still feared that they would freeze to death as soon as they stopped walking.

On the other hand, it seemed that there was no escaping that fate—and right now, it seemed impossible to take a single step forward.

Javert did not answer, although he followed along dazedly when Valjean spied a small opening in the walls of ice that surrounded them. Too small to be called an alcove, it did not truly provide any protection from the elements—but it looked marginally more inviting than the path before and behind them, and they were both too exhausted to go any further.

They both collapsed as soon as they had made it to the spot where the vertical wall gave way to a small hollow.

It was just as cold here. There was ice beneath them and ice at their back. They had no blankets, no firewood; there was some food in Valjean’s satchel, but merely opening it seemed to take more energy than he had left.

Nevertheless, Valjean forced himself to reach inside with aching fingers and drew out a piece of cheese. It was almost frozen solid; he tore it apart with his fingernails, and when Javert did not react, pushed half of it into Javert’s mouth before eating the other half.

It was too cold to taste anything; chewing the frozen cheese made his jaws ache, but if the misery of those nineteen years in the bagne had taught him anything, it was that without sustenance, a man did not live long.

Either way, he did not believe they would survive the night—if night it was, for the light had not changed even once since they had entered the cave.

Miserably, he thought of the child and of the promise he had made Fantine. What would become of her if he died here? Surely God could not have saved him from Toulon once more only to let him freeze to death here, so close to the child who had no one else left in the world.

He did not have the strength to pray, but with his remaining energy, he drew Javert closer, who was shaking just as Valjean was and did not respond when Valjean wrapped his arms around him.

A moment later, Valjean forced himself to draw back again and unbuttoned Javert’s coat with fingers so cold that he had lost all sensation in them. Every movement was agony; still, he spread Javert’s coat beneath them, then drew off his own coat and spread it over their bodies.

Then he wrapped his arms around Javert once more, pressing as close as he could, and prayed that they both would wake up again in the morning.


	2. Chapter 2

He must have fallen asleep. Dimly, Valjean remembered the bitter cold, an ache that had sunk into the marrow of his bones, his teeth chattering so hard it seemed they would shatter.

What had happened after that? He could not say. He must have slept, and during the night, they must have warmed each other, for now he was surrounded by warmth and there was a gentle light filling the alcove.

Confused, Valjean opened his eyes.

The first thing he saw was Javert, who was still asleep. His face was no longer as pale as the snow, his lips no longer blue. His skin had returned to a normal hue; when he exhaled, his breath was warm against Valjean’s face.

They were still in the passage that had led them deeper into the ice. All around them, walls of ice stretched—but something had changed.

Before, the eerie blue glow of the ice had lit their alcove. Now, instead, there was a warm light, flickering like that of a fire. But there was no fire nearby; they were still in the hollow in the ice…

Carefully, Valjean sat up, taking care not to disturb his coat to let in cold air, for Javert was still asleep.

When Valjean looked around, he could see that the glow indeed filled the icy passage around them with a warm, yellow light. There was something so comforting to the light that he wanted to burrow back beneath their blanket and return to sleep. Instead, he moved forward as far as the handcuffs allowed.

At the same moment, a gentle voice sounded from the shadows outside the circle of light, and he saw a figure approach.

“You should not be here,” the voice said with such quiet sadness that Valjean’s heart constricted. “Did you not promise to look after my child?”

It was the voice of Fantine. Valjean could see now that the figure who now faced him was indeed Fantine, with long, golden hair and teeth that gleamed like white pearls. She gave him a look of gentle remonstration, and Valjean felt his throat tighten with shame.

“Forgive me,” he said roughly. “I wanted to keep my promise. Only I am lost… Can you show us the way out of this cave?”

Fantine gave him a considering look.

“I can lead you of here,” she said after a moment, “but only you. That man there does not deserve my help.”

Valjean turned around to look at Javert, who was still asleep, covered by Valjean’s yellow coat. Even asleep, Javert had not lost much of his menacing air; like a dog at rest, he looked as if the lightest sound would wake him and make him spring forward immediately, his teeth at Valjean’s throat.

The realization that hit him all of a sudden was seductive—to take Fantine’s hand now and follow her out of these caves would not only save him from the ice, but also from Javert and his pursuit. If he left Javert behind here, asleep, Valjean would be free—not only free from Javert’s pursuit, but free from the chains and the state that was hunting him.

Javert had fallen, and Valjean had followed him down the icy gorge, risking his own life in the process. Was that alone not already more than could be asked from any man? Had he not done enough?

They had nearly frozen to death here. Who could fault him for taking the way out that was offered to him now? Javert would have died either way. Who but Valjean would have turned around and come to his help?

Fantine held out her hand; Valjean looked at it.

Then he took a step back, his heart sinking, for he did not know where he would find the strength to go on if Fantine were to leave now.

“I cannot do that,” he said bravely. “Both of us will go. I promise you, no matter what happens afterward, I will come find your daughter.”

“That is impossible,” Fantine said. “I can only lead one of you out of this place. Unless…”

“Unless?” Valjean asked.

Fantine stared at him, the warm glow suddenly receding until Valjean could no longer make out her features. When she spoke again, her voice had grown cold and harsh.

“Unless you answer a riddle. If you give me the correct answer, I will lead you past this passage.”

Valjean swallowed, suddenly feeling the earlier cold again, biting at the unprotected skin of his face.

“What is your riddle?” He peered at her face, although the shadows of the passage had suddenly closed in on them so that it was no longer possible to see her clearly.

“Where does the devil hide his gold in this forest?” she asked, her voice echoing eerily through the empty passage.

Valjean shuddered, suddenly afraid. Was it truly Fantine who had come to him here? Fantine was dead; he had seen her die. He had thought that her spirit had come to assist him, for he had promised her to save her daughter. Now he was no longer so certain.

Behind him, there was a sudden movement. When Valjean turned his head, he saw that Javert had awoken. His eyes were dark and narrow with suspicion, and he had sat up, leaning against the wall of ice behind him as he watched what was going on.

Valjean swallowed, thinking of the secret he had protected for so long—not for his own sake, but to help him keep his promise and rescue the child whose misery he had caused.

And yet, how could he save a life if it came at the cost of another?

“It is buried beneath a tree,” he said hollowly, “a tree protected by a band of zinc, near the road the coach to Montfermeil takes. Next to the tree, there is a heap of stones.”

He did not dare to turn around and watch Javert’s reaction; soon enough, he was certain, Javert would realize what he had admitted.

As soon as he spoke the words, Fantine was gone, and with her the seductive warmth that had filled their little hollow. Still, for the first time in a long time, Valjean was warm—warm enough to ignore the cold that was now biting at his exposed face once more.

When he looked curiously around them, he saw that the path they had followed had subtly changed.

Yesterday, it had been a narrow, endless tunnel, crystalline walls rising high on both sides as they walked. Now, in the distance, he could see the path opening once more. The strange illumination had changed as well. The light seemed to pulsate very slowly, the blue glow increasing, then fading, as if this cavern of ice had a heartbeat.

“Look,” he told Javert, pointing towards the end of the path. “That wasn’t there last night.”

He could not say whether it had indeed been a day. The light had never changed. But they had slept, and he felt rested.

“I recognized her,” Javert said in a low voice. “That was Fantine. But she is dead—they buried her after you were gone, in the free corner of the cemetery—”

Valjean closed his eyes in grief at Javert’s words. “I left the priest money for her burial. Did he not—”

“She ended where she belonged,” Javert muttered. “A public bed, a public grave. What’s the difference?”

Valjean bent his head and did not answer. A moment later, he felt the pull of the handcuff around his wrist.

“I don’t believe in ghosts,” Javert said. “Yet if that is the reason she came to haunt you, it has nothing to do with me. She is free to continue to haunt you once I have found an escape from this place.”

It was not that easy, Valjean thought quietly. Whatever this place was, it was nothing so simple. Had it even been Fantine? He had prayed that her spirit had found rest, but it seemed that was not so. Still, the Fantine he had known would certainly not lure men to their death. 

Once more they walked through a corridor of ice, the strange blue glow illuminating their way. It was still bitterly cold; after they had walked for a while, Valjean’s fingers began to ache again.

Slowly, the ice around them began to change. Little by little, the narrow path had begun to widen. At first they had not noticed it, but soon the space between the walls of ice was wide enough for two carriages to pass. They continued to walk onward. There was no other way to take, and Valjean clung to the hope that whoever—or whatever—he had talked to would keep to the promise of leading him out of the ice in exchange for his answer.

It was difficult to say how much time had passed when they finally came to the source of the eerie, pulsating glow. It might have been an hour or two when the path came to an end at last. Before them rose a strange wall of ice that stretched off to the right and the left for as far as the eye could see.

Above them, a ceiling of crystal hung, pulsing with light in the same rhythm of the ice. The wall before them was immaculately smooth, a flawless plane of ice—and directly in front of them, an opening beckoned.

Valjean looked at it, then turned towards Javert. Before he could speak a word, Javert took another step forward, the chain between the cuffs connecting them tightening.

“Come,” Javert said impatiently. “We will not survive for much longer down here.”

Valjean inclined his head in assent and followed. Together they entered the door in the ice.

Beyond the wall of ice, other crystalline walls rose all around them, all pulsating with the same light so that it was impossible to make out what was beyond. 

Two paths opened before them. One led to the right and one to the left. Javert stared at them, then, without another word, took the path to his right, and Valjean followed.

They had not walked for more than a minute before they found themselves once more at a crossroads. This time, three paths diverged. Javert looked cross, but did not ask for Valjean’s opinion. Once more he took the path to the right, and after turning several corners, they found themselves all of a sudden in a dead end, the path coming to an end as another wall of ice rose before them.

“A maze,” Valjean said quietly.

Javert drew in a breath, looking displeased as he turned around and marched back into the direction they had come from.

This time, Javert took the path in the middle. He had taken no more than few steps before he was stopped by the chain attached to his wrist.

“What?” he demanded brusquely when he turned his head to glare at Valjean, who had stopped.

“We should mark the path we’ve taken,” Valjean said. “Otherwise we will get lost in here.”

Javert laughed, as if he found that answer amusing.

“And are we not already lost?” he asked, but did not protest when Valjean bent down and scratched a mark into the ice.

They continued after that, Valjean faithfully marking every turn they took. Every now and then, they reached another dead end and had to backtrack. Javert never said a word, although more than once it was Valjean’s marks that saved them from walking in circles.

The maze seemed endless. Every time they turned a corner, the same sight awaited them. The ice stretched all around them, one path like the other. Javert, who had at first strode into the maze with such determination, soon slowed. They walked path after path, the icy walls of the maze rising high above them to the crystalline ceiling, cold, inhuman light pulsing and lighting their path.

Valjean remained silent, seeing only to his task of marking their path, although he had long since begun to wonder whether there was any sense in it. Betimes, a path opened before them that seemed as it should have a mark, and yet did not; at other times, a path beckoned that seemed to lead into a promising direction they had not explored before, and yet already bore a mark.

For hours they walked, the air turning continuously colder. Valjean’s fingers ached. Their breath escaped in pale clouds.

It became more and more difficult to trudge onward, until merely lifting his foot seemed to take more strength than he had left.

Javert had not spoken in a long time. Cold and silent, he had forced them onward until Valjean despaired of taking one more step.

Then, with no further warning, Javert collapsed.

For a moment, Valjean stared at the body at his feet, his mind too exhausted to understand what had come to pass. Finally, he went to his knees on the ice and turned Javert around.

Once again, Javert’s lips had turned blue, his face as pale as snow. Valjean touched Javert’s cheek and found that his own hands were shaking from the cold.

For how much longer could they go on? Perhaps, if he were to abandon Javert...

A long moment passed during which Valjean looked down at Javert, fighting with himself.

Even if he were to try and carry Javert onward, what good would that do? They would both die down here regardless. There was nothing to be won from burdening himself with the weight of a man who was certain to send him back to jail as soon as they found a way out of this strange cave.

At long last, Valjean closed his eyes and took a deep breath. Then he reached out and wrapped his arms around Javert, pulling him up and dragging him along.

It was hard to carry Javert when already, Valjean felt himself come to the end of his own strength. Every breath he took made his lungs ache with the cold. His hands that held on to Javert had long since lost all feeling. He was trembling uncontrollably, moving slowly and painfully.

He ached to take a break, to put Javert down only for a moment, but he knew that as soon as he stopped and sat down, he would never get up again.

Step after step, Valjean moved forward, past pain, past exhaustion, until at last he had ceased to exist as anything but a pair of feet to move onward and a pair of arms to grab and pull. Then his feet encountered an obstacle, and for a long moment, he paused, swaying, his mind blank.

At last, with great effort, he managed to turn and open ice-encrusted eyelids to gaze in bleak exhaustion at what stretched before him.

The maze was gone. Had he in his exhaustion dragged Javert out of the maze and into this stretch of ice without noticing? Valjean could not say.

It seemed just as likely that the walls of ice had suddenly vanished around him without his notice, or that indeed sometime during the past agonizing hours, he had died without realizing and found himself in an endless, icy hell where he, like Daedalus, would try to drag Javert to an exit that would forever remain out of reach.

When Valjean finally straightened, he found that they were no longer alone.

Before him stood a man. It was a wretched creature in ragged clothing, old and gaunt. Despite the ice, he was barefoot. The coarse red shirt he wore could not keep out the cold.

The man gazed at Valjean from eyes as cold and dead as the ice, and Valjean suddenly felt himself shaking from a cold that was not that of the cave.

Valjean knew the person in front of him.

The ragged clothes were the red he himself had worn in the bagne. Although the man wore no chains, his face marked by the passage of time like that of so many of the beggars who walked from town to town, village to village, Valjean found himself staring into familiar eyes as a deep terror made him shudder.

The man in front of him was Jean Valjean.

Perhaps no other who had known him only in Montreuil would have recognized him. Yet as impossible as it seemed, Valjean could not take his eyes of the familiar face and the familiar limbs now grown gaunt, broad shoulders sunk beneath an old burden that had mercilessly crushed him year after year.

This was the Jean Valjean of Toulon. This was the man he would have been had he never left, had the light in him been extinguished at long last.

Valjean gazed at him in horror. Then, to his great confusion, he saw the man bend and take hold of a block of ice with shaking hands. The worn, old body strained in agony as the man lifted it. Slowly and with terrible effort, he carried it to where Valjean could now see a structure of ice—a small circle formed of the same blocks the man was currently carrying.

Valjean shivered as he watched him.

He was half-frozen, but as he observed the wretched man labor, he felt a deeper cold take hold of him—a cold that reached into his chest and grasped his heart with icy fingers. An immense dread filled him as he stared at the vision before him. Minutes seemed to stretch into hours. The man walked slowly, his feet dragging as if he wore a chain, his eyes empty. He did not stop, nor did he look up even once.

A helpless despair rose in Valjean. At long last, as if drawn forward by an invisible chain he could not resist, Valjean moved towards the man.

Javert had been silent for a long time. Valjean could feel the handcuffs connecting their wrists tense, then Javert followed.

Try as he might, Valjean could not make himself turn around and look at Javert. It was all he could do to force himself to face the vision before him, and with it a terrifying truth: perhaps this mirror image was who he was. Perhaps the Valjean who had walked through the forest, believing himself to search for a child, was the dream vision, conjured by the mind of a man who had been trapped in the immutable hell of Toulon decade after decade.

The man did not react when Valjean moved closer. Valjean watched, his heart thudding in his breast, as the man kept laboring

Javert was still silent, so that finally, Valjean forgot he was even there. All Valjean could see was the man before him—a man whose light had been extinguished, a man who had become a ghost in truth, all that had once been Jean Valjean ground away by the millstone of Toulon.

At last Valjean reached out and touched the man’s arm.

A sharp pain shot through him, as if a splinter of ice had pierced straight into his heart. Valjean gasped, staring at the man before him in terror, and the man gazed back from eyes that were his own.

All around them, the ice continued to gleam with cold, inhuman light. Everywhere he looked, he only saw an endless white, until Valjean had almost forgotten where he was and why he had come here.

He could no longer say who was looking at whom. It seemed to him all of a sudden that it was he who was holding the block of ice, and another who was gazing at him, and when a voice spoke at last, he could no longer say whether he was speaking the words or listening to them. All he knew was that the voice was his own.

“Show us the way out,” it asked, and he knew even as he heard the question that there was no answer to it. There was no way out.

Valjean was silent, gazing at the man before him.

Again he asked, “There must be a way out. Please. Help us.”

Valjean slowly shook his head. There was no escape. There was nothing but this—the endless ice, the endless work, the featureless white that was all that existed.

“Please,” Valjean said again, desperate, and Valjean shook his head once more and turned away to continue the work that was all that was left.

The hand around his arm tightened and yet Valjean felt his fingers tighten around the arm in his grasp at the same time.

“Please. You know the way out,” he said, and he heard himself say it.

He turned and saw himself turn and gazed at himself until it felt as if he was balancing above a precipice once more, that if he tarried for just one more moment he would fall again, and this time he would truly be lost—lost in the ice for all eternity, lost to chains that would never loosen, lost to the old darkness that would swallow all light until at last he would be ice, too, continuing to work without end, night and day, lost to the bagne and a grindstone that ground on even beyond death.

Valjean could not speak, but as he gazed at himself, Valjean saw suddenly that the brick he had been clutching was no brick at all, and the structure the other had appeared to build was no circle either.

It was a tree of ice, standing in a clearing in a forest of other trees of ice. What he held in his hand was no brick but a large rock, only the dark stone he remembered so well had turned to gleaming ice as well.

Valjean knew where he was, and he knew what was asked of him.

Two times he had been asked a question; the third question had not spoken, but there was no need. Valjean knew the sacrifice that was asked of him.

With Javert still handcuffed to his wrist, he turned away from himself and wearily began to carry the rock to the small pile of similar rocks he himself had piled up, close to the tree with its ring of zinc.

There, before the pile of stones, he knelt. With shaking hands he lifted the other rocks away. He dared not look up to see whether Javert was watching.

Perhaps he could have told himself that Javert was too exhausted to remember what Valjean had done, or that the tree and the pile of stones would mean nothing to him, or else that even if Javert would realize what this place was, he would never be able to find it in the forest.

Valjean had no such hope left in his heart. He had surrendered it all as he reached out.

A final sacrifice was asked of him, and beneath the unyielding, familiar eyes, he bared even this small, precious part of his soul.

The small box filled with cedar shavings in which he had hidden all the money he had earned during his years in Montreuil had rested beneath the pile of rocks. With it, Valjean offered up not money, but the spark of hope in his soul that had never been extinguished even during his second time in Toulon. This small box held his one chance of fulfilling a promise he had made to save a child whose mother he had not been able to save.

As Valjean opened the box, light filled his eyes.

It was a beautiful light. He gazed at it for as long as he could, the warmth of hope filling his limbs for as long as it shone.

Far too quickly, the light began to dim, all warmth leeched away by the ice. In the end, all that remained in Valjean’s hand was an empty box of ice.

His strength had ebbed away with the light. When Valjean raised his head, he could no longer see the other. All that surrounded him was endless white, the cold seeping deep into his bones.

Javert was kneeling on the frozen ground beside him. As Valjean painfully turned his head, he saw Javert sink forward until he came to rest in the cold snow. Valjean wanted to reach out and shake Javert awake. He knew they could not remain here. If they fell asleep in the snow, they would never wake again. Even so, Valjean was too tired to move.

At long last, even his own strength failed him, and he sank forward next to Javert, his eyes falling closed.

If death came now, he had done what he could. The snow was soft, and for the first time in a long time, Valjean no longer felt the cold. It would be good to sleep.

Still. He wished he had been able to save Javert and the girl...


	3. Chapter 3

The snow was soft and welcoming, a blanket that would cover him and promised rest. For so long Valjean had fought, past all human endurance. Now, at last, he was granted peace.

Javert was resting by his side. The wind picked up, carrying heavy snowflakes. With his last strength, Valjean made himself turn and stretched out his hand.

Against his fingertips, Javert's skin was as cold as ice. Small icicles had formed in his whiskers.

Was he still breathing?

Valjean stretched out his hand despite the aching of his muscles. Shaking, his fingertips touched Javert's lips.

Was there a whisper of breath? Was there still a hint of living warmth?

Javert's eyes had closed. Snow had begun to gather in his hair, so that he looked like a large, threatening animal at last at rest.

Valjean wanted to wake him, but it was already too late. The cold made it impossible to move. Even he, who had fought all of his life, no longer had the strength to shoulder this burden fate had placed in his path. And so, with Javert's frozen face the last thing he saw, he closed his eyes.

***

Warmth surrounded Valjean. He was resting on something soft—his bed back in Montreuil? No, he thought, his mouth slowly forming a smile. He knew this bed. He knew this sensation—the first soft mattress he had slept upon after nineteen long years in the bagne of Toulon.

He was back in the bed the bishop of Digne had given him for the night. Any moment now Valjean would rise. He would go to that good man's chamber, and he would kneel before his bed and beg him for forgiveness, and then, at last, perhaps there would truly be peace...

It took great strength to open his eyes. Brilliant light greeted Valjean. Before his eyes spread an expanse of brightness—untouched, purest white, unmarked by a man's footsteps.

Valjean smiled to see it. He was certain now that he had died, back there in the ice, and that this was Heaven.

He reached out his hand, or tried to—and then the light receded, or else his eyes grew accustomed to the glare, and he saw that there were dark shapes among the brilliant light. Little by little, they came into focus.

Tall, dark trees surrounded Valjean. Branches bare of leaves reached out towards the heavens.

The sun was shining, reflecting off the snow. This was the light he had seen, and as Valjean began to realize where he was, he slowly grew aware of the icy chill that suffused his limbs.

Valjean raised a hand in front of his eyes and saw his fingers shaking, blue from the cold.

How could he feel so cold if he was dead? Could it be that he was not dead? And if he yet lived, then where was he?

The last thing Valjean remembered was the maze of ice and what he'd found at its center...

Valjean pushed himself up, all of his muscles protesting. He shivered when he saw where he was.

Before him was the pile of stones he had used to mark the spot where he had buried his money, and there was the tree with the ring of zinc surrounding its trunk.

How had he come to be here? All Valjean remembered of his journey was the fall…

All of a sudden, Valjean realized that he was not alone in the snow. Next to him, a body rested, the dark, woolen greatcoat turned white from the snow that was beginning to gather on it.

"Javert!"

Valjean shivered at the sound of his own voice and how it echoed in the empty forest. He reached out to shake Javert awake—and it was then that he saw that the handcuffs that had bound them to each other for so long had shattered.

Metal was still surrounding Valjean’s wrist. A few links of the chain dangled from it. One link had burst, as if the bitter cold had frozen it to brittleness, yet surely that was impossible. Jean Valjean had borne chains for much of his life, and he knew that iron remained cruel and unforgiving in hottest summer and deepest winter.

He stared at his wrist for a moment, dumbfounded—not by the sudden freedom, but the lack of a connection he had grown used to during the past days.

If it had indeed been days. If it had truly happened…

And yet, one handcuff still dangled from his wrist, and there was Javert before him.

"Javert," he said again with urgency and reached out to shake his shoulder.

Only silence answered him. Valjean's heart clenched with sudden trepidation.

"Javert," he said more loudly, pushing Javert onto his back.

Javert remained unmoving. His eyes were closed. His face was very pale. At that moment, he looked like a statue carved of marble—as rigid and devoid of life as the caryatid Valjean had once supported with his back.

Valjean held a shivering hand over Javert's mouth. Was he still breathing?

Valjean could feel no warmth, but he had long since lost all sensation in his fingers. Helpless, he bent over Javert, listening desperately for the sound of breathing, but to no avail.

Had Valjean woken too late? Had Javert collapsed here in the snow with him and died by his side while Valjean lay senseless?

He shook his head as terror swelled inside him, and with it the memory of Javert pressed against him in the little hollow in the strange underworld they'd fallen into. His fingers scrambled at Javert's coat, his hand pushing beneath Javert’s clothes, searching for a reassuring heartbeat.

Was there warmth in the skin beneath his fingers? Valjean could no longer tell.

Everything seemed to have turned to ice. All warmth had leeched from the world as he remained bent over Javert, listening, praying.

A sudden certitude rose in him that if he allowed this man to die, then he was truly damned himself. If his freedom had been bought with the death of even one man, it was no freedom at all but would bring with it eternal suffering, for he knew that if he strayed from the path set out for him by even one step, he would plunge down into eternal darkness once more.

Tears ran down Valjean's face, burning hot in the freezing cold. They dripped from his cheeks as he leaned over Javert and pressed his lips to his mouth, breathing into him as he prayed and wept all alone there in the forest with no company but that of the frozen corpse of the man who had hunted him for so long.

With the shackles shattered, Valjean was free to leave now—but how could this be freedom if it was bought with the death of another?

Valjean's tears kept dripping onto Javert's face, where they froze in gleaming tracks. But Valjean did not move. He kept kneeling over him, breathing into him, his palm against Javert's cold chest as he wept silently.

Then, all of a sudden, Valjean became aware of a light. When he looked up, tears still running down his cheeks, he saw that the glow of moon-lit snow had increased in brightness until it seemed that the sun itself had come down onto the snow. As Valjean gazed at the forest surrounding him in shocked confusion, he saw that the light was moving. Bright, golden light shone from beneath the trees surrounding them, slowly coming closer and closer. The light was so bright that Valjean could make out nothing but the dazzling brilliance of it, a warm, golden radiance that transformed everything it touched until at last even the bitter cold receded.

The light was very close now. Dimly, his eyes still tearing, Valjean thought he saw within the light the shape of child, which now gracefully reached out towards Javert.

Beneath his palm, he suddenly felt a heartbeat.

Startled, Valjean turned back towards Javert and saw that the unnatural pallor of his skin had lessened. As he watched, Javert's lips parted. Then Javert drew in a deep breath, his eyelids moving as if he was slowly waking from a dream.

Valjean stared at Javert’s features, which were still bathed in golden light. Valjean did not dare to release him, as if the strange miracle that had come to pass would be undone if he looked away for a single heartbeat.

Then Javert's eyes slowly opened and he blinked, looking as dazed and disoriented as Valjean had felt when he had first awoken in the snow.

"Jean Valjean," Javert murmured—although for once, the sound of Valjean’s name on his lips was not full of disdain or fury but soft with wonder. "Where am I?"

Small icicles had formed in the rough wilderness of his whiskers. As Valjean watched, they melted. Javert's heart thudded with reassuring steadiness against his palm until Valjean realized that his hand was still pressed against Javert's bare skin, which now felt scaldingly hot against his own.

Valjean’s lips tingled with the awareness of how mere moments ago, they had been pressed against Javert's. It was difficult to take his eyes off Javert when even now, the wetness glistening on Javert's cheeks was that of Valjean's own tears which had frozen on his skin and were now thawing There was a sudden rushing sound in Valjean's ears, like that of a icy river when the spring thaw arrived.

Heat suffused Valjean’s own cheeks as he hastily moved back.

"You are alive."

His own voice sounded hoarse and strange to Valjean.

Only then did he remember the blinding light that had approached him. In awe and terror, he looked up, half expecting to find he knew not what—perhaps an angel standing next to him in the snow.

Instead, the ground next to him was a pristine and undisturbed white. The light had gone. Once more, the snow they were resting on was illuminated only by the light of the moon and the stars, the bare trees surrounding the small clearing reaching out towards the sky with stark, black branches.

Valjean looked around the clearing in confusion, unable to understand what had happened. At last, he saw that he had been mistaken. They were no longer alone.

From the darkness between the trees, a small child had stepped forward, staring at them now with wide, frightened eyes. Her clothes were tattered. Despite the snow she wore no coat, her small feet barefoot in wooden shoes, and her reddened hands clutching at a heavy wooden bucket.

Valjean stood slowly but did not approach, so as not to scare her.

"We were lost in the forest," he said gently. "We were traveling to Montfermeil. Is it far from here?"

"Not far, sir," the child said, still looking at him in trepidation. Her eyes were gleaming, as though she too had been weeping. "I can show you to the inn. Madame will have a room for you, if you can pay."

"What inn is that?" Valjean asked.

"The _Sergeant of Waterloo_ , sir."

Valjean gazed at her, remembering once more the light and the warmth that had approached.

"What is your name?" he asked.

"Cosette," she said in her small voice, half-frozen from the cold, and he started.

"Cosette. Let me carry your water."

She gazed at him from wide eyes, her terror melting into relief as she looked at him, just as the ice on Javert's face had melted all of a sudden.

"Does not your companion need help, sir?" she then asked.

Valjean turned back around to look at Javert, and found Javert gazing at him in turn. There was a look on Javert's face he had never seen there before.

Doubt.

When he held out his hand to Javert, Javert flinched back from it. His eyes wild, Javert looked around, shaking his head as if he too remembered all that had come to pass and refused to believe it.

Did he remember what Valjean remembered? Even now Valjean could not say whether it had been real, or whether the two of them, half-dying, had merely stumbled through the snow together, near death and walking through icy landscapes that did not truly exist outside their minds.

Then Javert's eyes fell on the tree with its ring of zinc, and he recoiled visibly. A moment later, he whipped around and found that next to them, there was the pile of stones, now covered with snow. Javert stared at it, breathing heavily. Then his gaze came to rest on Valjean once more, and in his eyes Valjean could see the truth: Javert remembered all that Valjean remembered.

Javert remembered the maze in the ice and the strange, echoing caverns. Most of all, he remembered the strange encounters, the riddles they had been asked—and the answers Valjean had given for their passage.

Valjean had escaped by offering up the location of the money hidden in this forest. Six hundred thousand francs were buried beneath the pile of stones directly next to them. Valjean had paid for their escape by sacrificing the one thing he had hoped would allow him to continue to live a free life, to do good, and most of all to give Cosette the life she deserved.

Now, Javert knew. If Javert were to arrest him now, he could send Valjean back to prison and recover the money himself.

Javert did not move. Instead, after a long moment, he pushed himself to his feet and tried to take a faltering step away from the stones. After the first step, he stumbled, and without thought, Valjean moved to his side and draped Javert's arm around his shoulder in support.

"Careful," Valjean said, then fell silent at the look Javert gave him—a look full of wildness, like that of an animal that discovered itself caught in a trap.

Javert's teeth were bared, his lips twisted and rigid. There was agony in his eyes, Javert's body stiff against Valjean's—but Javert did not tear free or push Valjean away, nor did he reach out for Valjean's wrist to shackle him once more.

"Javert," Valjean said very softly, his voice trembling as he spoke. "That final riddle—they refused to let me pay for your passage."

A sacrifice had been demanded from him, and Valjean had made it. Javert had not. Valjean had not wanted to abandon him, but despite all that Valjean had already given up, Javert had been left behind.

How did Javert come to be here? What sacrifice had he made?

Javert met his eyes for a long moment. Then he laughed, a hoarse, half-mad sound as brittle and sharp as the ice around them. Javert raised his hand and gazed at the handcuff still clasped around it, the broken chain dangling from it.

"Something has come undone," he murmured dazedly, and then he grimly pressed his lips together and would speak no more.

Valjean watched as Javert turned his head. Javert’s gaze fell onto the tree with its ring of zinc and then onto the pile of stones, covered by a blanket of innocent white that could no longer protect its secret from Javert's gaze.

Despair rose once more inside Valjean. He looked at the small girl in her tattered clothes and wooden shoes, chilblains on her hands, the holes in her clothes revealing the black and blue bruises that marked her body. Without him, what would become of her? And without the money, what did he have to offer to lighten the misery her young life had been so far?

Had he not tried to draw Javert back to life, Valjean could have taken Cosette's little hand to lead her back to the inn and take her away from Montfermeil.

It should have been an easy choice to make. But even now Valjean could feel a weight on his shoulders. That burden had settled there long ago, and he knew he would carry this truth with him to his grave: that if his happiness were bought with the misery of even a single person, the narrow path to the light he had tried to walk would lead straight back down into the darkness he had dwelt in for so long.

Javert straightened, his arm slipping from Valjean's shoulder.

Valjean slowly moved towards the girl, waiting wearily for the moment when Javert would call out his name and rush to his side to clasp him in shackles once more.

But the call never came. The forest was silent save for the creaking of branches overhead.

Valjean smiled at the little girl and reached out to take the heavy bucket to carry it himself. Then he turned and found Javert still rooted to the spot, staring at him, his eyes reflecting the silver light of the moon.

For a long moment, they looked at each other.

Valjean started when he saw wetness gleam on Javert's cheeks. A strange sensation took hold of him once more, something shifting and stretching within his chest. He remembered the sensation of Javert's mouth against his own, the sensation of bedding down with him in the ice, inescapable bound together, the warmth of Javert's body all he had.

Valjean held out his hand and waited. Snow was still falling, heavy flakes swirling all around them, dancing in the bright light of the moon.

After a moment, Javert followed.


End file.
